Posted by: George () on Sat Sep 8 15:59:01 2007

> >>> Jack. I guess I am a doubting Thomas, but from the side view it appears Sosa is merely taking the hands back and holding the angle rather than using THT. <<<
>
> Hi George
>
> I will markup an across-the-plate view of this swing that should change your mind. It will show that the bottom-hand and knob are almost stationary while the bat-head arcs rearward about 24 inches. This view clearly shows the top-hand arcing back around a more stationary bottom-hand well before shoulder rotation.. The clip should be up in a few days.
>
> Jack Mankin

Jack. Thanks for review the post and your future attempt to show the side view of Sosa. But per Sosa's 606th homerun on mlb.com it appears that he is in fact doing exactly what I mentioned which is to simply take the hands back, hold the angle, and launch his swing (much like Jim Thome who also homered yesterday) and can be seen on mlb.com.

I would suggest that in your footage, you should zoom in on the wrists of the hitter. In that way I believe we can all come to a better conclusion on the amount of torque (radial deviation) that actually occurs. As such I just do not see the same Gary Sheffield type torque you describe in your wood bat video/illustration in most good hitters (with the exception of Gary Sheffield and a few others). This is likely because half of the hitters hold the angle at launch (Thome, Konerko, Ortiz) rather than use the more elastic principles you describe.

Thus if the hitter holds/stops the angle, the batspeed generated is a product of pure strength strength as opposed to creating opposing forces. This is not to say that using more THT would not contribute to a faster swing. But what it does say is is THT necessary for the already successful hitter and to what degree does it exist among major league hitters.